I hate Artificial Intelligence (AI). I know I’m coming off a little strong, but it’s true. AI usage in the classroom is driving me insane. I don’t want to use ChatGPT for an assignment, even if it’s a “prove that AI is bad” assignment. I don’t want to be forced to check a box to claim that I didn’t use AI to write a 3-sentence discussion post. I don’t want my peers to tell me to “just ask Chat!” when I’m asking them for their creative input on a project. I hate walking into the library or sitting down in class and seeing ChatGPT pulled up on anyone’s computer. Think for yourself!  

There are a multitude of articles talking about how AI is making college students dumber, but it is hard to fully understand the chokehold it has on the average student until you witness it in the flesh. I take many classes where the bulk of the work is reading and writing: two skills which are incredibly important to develop and cultivate while you have access to valuable resources in higher education. To squander that gift in exchange for an algorithm to do your thinking because you are lazy is bonkers. I don’t want to read an intense 300-page book in two days, either, but I’m going to suffer through it because I might learn a thing or two if not about the content, then about my own capacity for perseverance.   

I think some of the reasons people are so tempted to use ChatGPT to do their assignments are because they are afraid of A) giving up B) failure and C) not looking like the smartest one in the room. ((D) all of the above is also an option.) We are becoming dependent on AI to think for us, and we praise it for doing so. The social pressures to blindly accept AI usage are getting stronger, and each day humans are inching closer to becoming laundry and dish-doing machines.   

The Luddites were a group of textile workers who, during the beginnings of industrialization of the Western factory world, were staunchly opposed to the machines being introduced to take over their jobs. I don’t know how wrong they were; these were skilled workers who had spent most of their lives learning and honing their trade only to be replaced by a cheap machine that produces shoddy work. When we use the term ‘Luddite’ today, we mean someone who is opposed to new technology and while this is technically true, I would argue that we need to expand our colloquialization of ‘Luddite’ to include the fear of replacement. They didn’t want the textile machines to replace their skilled labor, I don’t want AI to replace my art and writing. Maybe I am a Luddite, and that’s okay!  

The Internet has always been a fearsome beast, so the shift toward AI is just a shift in focus. But that doesn’t mean that it is any less dangerous.